​Today I intend to discuss the flawed intellectualism proffered by the so-called alt-right, a term I use here in contravention of recommended media usage because the example I will discuss comes from an intellectual of the alt-right school who denies being a white nationalist while writing approvingly of “Aryan heritage” and of “my support for the Alt-Right’s struggle to prevent another white genocide.” I will forestall efforts to dismiss my critique with arguments over the terminology of white nationalism in order to focus on the faulty arguments and bad history used to erect an alt-right philosophy.

​In an “open letter” last week, a philosopher with a Ph.D. from SUNY Stony Brook suggested that he might file a defamation suit against the university after faculty in the philosophy department strategized about how to deal with an alumnus that they had identified as an “Aryan white supremacist.” According to news reports, they want to conduct a “review” of Iranian-American Jason Reza Jorjani’s Ph.D. work, even though there has been no allegation of misconduct, a move prompted by Jorjani speaking at white nationalist Richard Spencer’s recent conference, the one where some attendees gave a fascist salute as Spencer shouted “Hail Trump!” Jorjani provided a copy of the faculty meeting notes (which they mistakenly emailed to him), and I think that he has read too much into them. In the notes, an unnamed speaker accused Jorjani of being involved with white supremacy and then added, “We are going to review his research, his dissertation, and we may or may not issue a statement, though this runs the risk of giving the issue more oxygen.” As I read this, the philosophy department wasn’t planning to revoke his Ph.D., as Jorjani suggested, but rather intended to read his work in order to be able to discuss it should he achieve greater prominence within the so-called “alt-right.”

Nevertheless, if there is a movement to revoke his degree, then Jorjani is right to object to this unusual action, which would violate the principles of academic freedom. In doing so, however, Jorjani denied being a white nationalist and then defended his interest in Nazi Germany by embracing the fringe idea that Nazis were right to investigate the supernatural and magic: “I am not one [a white nationalist], even if I have argued, rightly (in my October Stockholm speech), that National Socialist Germany was the only political regime to seriously consider the implications of mainstream scientific recognition and widespread cultivation of those latent human capacities hitherto marginalized as ‘paranormal.’” (The Soviets and Americans also studied the paranormal, often with laughable results.) In his book Prometheus and Atlas (2016), based on his Ph.D. dissertation (which he requested be excluded from full-text research databases), Jorjani advocates the idea that “spectral agencies” from the netherworld act on human beings through “demonic possession,” from which claim he professes to philosophically prove the futility and wrongness of materialism and thus science and even objective reality itself. While he claims that the supernatural is merely a part of the natural world our ideological science refuses to accept because it would destroy our social, political, and economic structures (e.g. he thinks psychic powers would undermine confidence in the stock market), the feignt toward naturalism is essentially a cover for an effort to reenchant the world through an appeal to pagan mysticism, dressed up in the language of science but without the scientific method. For him, all is ideological. But what ideology?

In addition to Jorjani’s lengthy “open letter” of upset, I also read the introduction to Prometheus and Atlas, a book transparently modelled on the Apollonian and Dionysian division of Nietzsche’s Birth of Tragedy, but which, unlike Nietzsche, selected punished gods rather than creative ones in order to cast white people as victims. It was published by Arktos Media, a publisher devoted to Indo-European culture and the European New Right, which also happens to employ Jorjani as its editor-in-chief. Coincidence, I’m sure, like the fact that they focus on publishing Weimar-era “Conservative Revolutionary” German writers. Jorjani’s book, under much superficial erudition (and an overarching framework derived from Martin Heidegger, the influential German philosopher who was a Nazi from 1933 to 1945 and only ambiguously denounced the movement thereafter), fails in one key aspect: It does not appear to clearly distinguish between the actual supernatural (should such a thing exist) and a mere belief in the supernatural, because he simply accepts cranky fringe “research” into ESP, and in so doing is compelled to acknowledge the objective “reality” of Yahweh’s and Allah’s miracles, but denigrates them as parapsychological phenomena in order to declare the Jewish and Islamic gods to be genocidal Semitic tyrants opposed to the true Aryan’s faith in himself. Heil! Well, he doesn’t say Aryan and Semitic per se in the introduction to the book, but he does refer only to Europeans and Iranians—the Indo-Europeans, who were once termed “Aryan”—as the beneficiaries of Western civilization and the Arabs as “brown” people who corrupted its primitive purity. In his open letter, however, he takes pains to say that many of his friends and colleagues are Jewish, and that he spent time with “Jewish adherents of fascism.”

Because of all this, he can craft allegations of a conspiracy to suppress the supernatural out of what were in reality genuine efforts to see through the ideology of belief. Oh, and of course as an Iranian he also concludes that Greek philosophers and thus the Western tradition as a whole owe their accomplishments to … wait for it … Persia. From Persia, which he sees as both white and spiritually pure before “brown” Arabs hijacked it for Islam, he sees the Aryan heritage as reemerging. In his open letter, he writes: “This Aryan heritage has roots in the Earth that are thousands of years old and the branches of its tree will grow through distant star systems.” Space Aryans! It seems like there was a Star Trek episode about that… And a movie…

When I say Jorjani’s erudition is superficial, I should give an example: He bases a lengthy argument (and, frankly, the book’s title and its central thesis on Western Civilization) on the idea that the Titan Atlas was “the world-building sovereign of Atlantis,” citing it to Plato. But Plato’s Atlas, as described in the Critias, was the son of Poseidon by a mortal woman, one of ten coequal children, and he is not the primordial Titan but rather the embodiment of the name “Atlantic” (which, in reality, was named for the Titan), just as other names of the children embodied other geographic areas, such as Gaderius, retroactive namesake of Gades. In short, they were different dudes. Jorjani, drawing on fringe literature, mistakenly identifies Poseidon’s sons as the Giants and/or Nephilim (he specifically connects Atlantis to the Watchers), conflating the Gigantomachy and the Titanomachy after mistaking Poseidon’s ten sons for Kronos’ brothers and sisters, the Titans. Jorjani knows all about the fringe argument that Atlantis was the “antediluvian world” of the Bible, and very little about the actual literature involved. Indeed, he claims that Atlantis was “the common origin ‘myth’ that lies at both founts of Western Civilization: Classical Greece and ancient Israel.” In truth, Plato most likely modeled parts of the Critias on a version of the Near East Flood Myth known to him, just as the Nephilim section of Genesis draws on that same source material. Since the Atlantis story does not stretch farther back than Plato, it is hardly a foundation of Greek philosophy or culture; indeed, most Greeks didn’t think much about Atlantis at all.

Jorjani’s slippery reliance on fringe literature is exemplified by his discussion of UFOs and folklore (he’s a big fan of Ezekiel’s “spaceship” encounter), which he explicitly bases on Jacques Vallée, cheerfully ignorant of Vallée’s poor evidence and faulty reasoning. He is, for Jorjani, a valuable source precisely because he stands opposed to “mainstream scientists.” Jorjani wants to see UFOs as part of the troubling paranormal realm that challenges the scientific consensus on materialist reality, but his argument presupposes a “UFO phenomenon” that cannot be proven to exist outside of the human perception that independent experiences (lights in the sky, encounters with humanoid beings, night terrors, etc.) are somehow part of a larger phenomenon. In other words, he again chooses not to distinguish between human perception and how we can determine whether that perception has an objective reality.

He may playact at scholarship, but Jorjani’s work is as riddled with error as any other fringe writer, despite the more complex sentences and appeals to Germanic philosophers.

In addition to being a supporter of paranormal research, Jorjani has also been a guest on Red Ice Radio, an outlet for both fringe history and white nationalism, and he declared the arrival of Islam in the old Persian Empire to be “history’s first and greatest white genocide.” He claimed in his “open letter” that his goal in marrying fringe history to alt-right politics and Germanic philosophy is to prevent another “white genocide” by Muslims.

Is it churlish of me to point out the dismal failure of German National Socialism to fulfill any of its promises and achieve any of its goals?
It is surprising that seventy odd years after the "Aryans" brought half Europe to ruin that anybody can believe that the "Aryan" idea has anything to offer.
One possible reason for this is that many its proponents today did not actually live or suffer in Europe during the Nazi period whilst another is the the tawdry glamour of aggressive militarism.
I think I remember a quotation :-
"Do you know what fear is?....The Thirds Reich was fear"
Time and distance will never change that reality.

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Titus pullo

12/18/2016 10:30:21 am

This is so ridiculous What the hell is "white" anyway? The race obsessive US govt defines white as anyone from Europe , North Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia (not India?). The old theory of the white race being from a small tribe that left the Caucuses was from some of the worst thinking of the 19th century. And by forcing this race obsessive stuff in collecting data and forcing free association based on lunatic views of judging people by race or whatnot, the govt creates followers of race or ethnic nationalists. White nationalism was a joke and had few followers until the Feds decided to play diversity politics....as I said what gets hell is white anyway? There is no such thing as white people

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An Over-Educated Grunt

12/18/2016 01:36:01 pm

Having seen the 1850 census records, I can comfortably say that this post is redolent of the vast and feculent fields of manure one typically associates with stock finishing pens.

The US government has been collecting racial information, at least so far as "Negro" and "Indian," and country-of-origin information for immigrants, since at least the middle of the 19th Century. Further, "white nationalist" politics as seen today had their embryo at least in the second Klan of the early 20th Century. You could make a strong argument for it tracing back father based on Alexander Stevens's remarks on the Confederate secession regarding race relations.

But sure. Blame it on diversity.

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Scott Hamilton

12/18/2016 10:31:41 am

Wait... He got a Ph.D based on the idea that "spectral agencies" make objective reality useless? I think that's a bigger scandal than if he had it taken away. Surely even philosophers understand the concept of special pleading.

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PostModernPrimate

12/19/2016 02:35:42 pm

I was thinking the same thing! What credible department/university would 1) allow such a dissertation to be pursued, and 2) allow it to pass?!

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Only Me

12/18/2016 01:29:18 pm

Imagine that; a pro-Aryan philosopher who advocates alt-right ideology *denies* he's a white nationalist, while using fringe literature to argue the validity of his advocacy.

That cognitive dissonance is a bitch.

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Elizabeth Stuart

5/10/2018 01:41:35 am

You took the words out of my mouth! Exactly! Although he expouses alt- right nationalism, please don't identify him with it? What a cop out! The little weasel isn't even man enough to own what he believes!

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Odjur

12/18/2016 01:31:06 pm

You (or the source!) may mean "Conservative Revolutionary" rather than "Conservative Reactionary" as the former was a movement in Weimar Germany while the latter is a nigh-tautology.

"Oh, and of course as an Iranian he also concludes that Greek philosophers and thus the Western tradition as a whole owe their accomplishments to … wait for it … Persia."

It's sad when people's obvious biases blind them to reason.

On an unrelated note, did I ever tell you about how the Irish single-handedly preserved the collective wisdom and culture of Western civilization after the fall of the Roman empire? =P

"Space Aryans! It seems like there was a Star Trek episode about that… And a movie…"

... I was going to say David Myatt, actually. He's shown creepy fixation on both interstellar white nationalist fantasy and Prometheus as well.

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Kathleen

12/18/2016 05:01:56 pm

What criteria does Jorjani and similarly minded folk use to define "white" and "Aryan"? Or is it like pornography - "you know it when you see it"?

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Kathleen

12/18/2016 10:01:57 pm

Really, how would they determine if I'm white/Aryan or not?

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V

12/19/2016 12:16:23 am

Honestly? It is exactly that. "They know it when they see it." It's anyone who is enough "like them," in their own judgment, which probably changes from day to day. Or even hour to hour.

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Semiyah

1/20/2017 09:09:13 am

Is anyone on this site even aware that Jorjani is himself Iranian and most of his videos online are in Persian? There's a very uncomfortable erasure going on here from actual white people about actual "Ayrans" discussing their own history.

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El Cid

12/18/2016 07:47:26 pm

Wait -- the *good* thing about the Nazis was their fascination with occult magic powers?

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Not the Comte de Saint Germain

12/18/2016 10:34:08 pm

Well, it certainly wasn't the worst thing about them.

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El Cid

12/20/2016 10:24:21 pm

Fair enough.

'Sure they were wrong for killing millions of people because of their ludicrous poisonous notions about race and ideology, but you have to give them credit for searching for hobgoblins.'

Bob Jase

12/19/2016 02:59:34 pm

"But Plato’s Atlas, as described in the Critias, was the son of Poseidon by a mortal woman, one of ten coequal children, and he is not the primordial Titan"

Well that's what THEY want you to think.

Turtles all the way down.

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Pacal

12/24/2016 10:05:25 pm

The cry of modern day racists of "white genocide" is beatifully ironic in a way. during the early. And mid 19th century many racists were anticipating, with joy and intense satisfaction, the disapearance of "lessor" "inferior" races all of the world and looked for the means to speed up the process.

Sadly for their genocidal fantasies the other races didn't disapear as they "should" have. The result was by the 1920s the appearance of hysterical, foaming at the mouth, rabid diatribes screaming about how the very existence of other races was a mortal threat to "whites".

Thus we got hysteria about the yellow peril, and "white" purity being threatened by the mongrel hordes of "sub-humanity"
. Thus the "white genocide" fantasy is sort of a displacement of the historical fantasy, of genocide, of the intellectual ancestors of those modern day racists.

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